Till swollen with cunning, of a self-conceit,
His waxen wings did mount above his reach,
And, melting, heavens conspir'd his overthrow;
For, falling to a devilish exercise,
And glutted now with learning's golden gifts,
He surfeits upon cursed necromancy;
Nothing so sweet as magic is to him,
Which he prefers before his chiefest bliss:
And this the man that in his study sits.
: Dr. Faustus (Marlowe)

Friday, July 21, 2006

Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men

Bear with me…I’m still in this phase of mind. Gained an objective perspective on emotional disappointment of late. This is my way of making head or tail of that. I’ve thrived on a lot of planning, I must confess. Guess we all do. Show me a person who claims to ‘go with the flow’ and I’ll show you a liar.

So we plan and we plan. Some people make one, while others like me have many contingency plans…if this doesn’t work out, then this might…if not then I have this as my backup…etc. etc. etc. And some plans fructify; others come to nought. Either which way, we lose…precious time. What was the point of planning for contingencies when this is successful? If this was going to be unsuccessful, why did I waste time planning for it?

The only objective look that I’ve found in this entire predicament is uncertainty. As we’re unsure of all outcomes, we plan for as many of them as we possibly can, given our capabilities. These are the games people play and they are the games nations play. If time is what we make of it, then is this how it was meant to be? And while I’m on it let me add another observation, since this deals with emotional disappointment. Why do we ‘pay’ attention and ‘spend’ time? (Particularly in the English language because we do very different things with both time and attention in Hindi or any other Indian vernacular languages…)